User blog:Drix153/Of Clerics and Gods
Goblins, hobgoblins, humans, and ogres thronging the arena let out a collective roar as one of the monsters—what looked like a cross between larupia and airut—broke sight of the slaves and tore its way through their exposed flank. The other creatures, smelling blood and sensing weakness, converged as one for a feeding frenzy, maiming and goring those left standing. It was bloody and cruel...and the crowd loved every minute of it. Yokrad, the so-called "New Big High War God", stood from a throne perched above the arena and called for more entertainment. The crowd cheered enthusiastically, their clamor causing the tower's balcony from which Rosaline watched to shudder precariously. She quickly withdrew inside, wary of the aged stonework and sick from what she had just witnessed. Of course, she mused. This was New Yok, a city of beasts and arseholes. Slavery and gladiatorial combat were the norm here. But unlike the hundreds of slaves in New Yok, she at least had Yokrad's favor. Knocking on her chamber door drew Rosaline out of her thoughts. She knew Yokrad had supplied her guards outside with keys, but kept the door locked as a general rule of thumb. Calling out to the knocker that she was on her way, Rosaline hobbled across the room, avoiding the weaker patches of stone while keeping weight off her left leg. It'd only been five days since she was tortured by a black knight and her wounds hadn't fully healed yet, but according to a goblin shaman she would make a full recovery. She reached the door just as it was being opened by one of her guards, a dumpy ork she knew as Lum. He grunted something unintelligible and stepped aside to allow a scantily clad aviansie through. It was obviously female, as well a slave—Yokrad made sure his "property" were branded with his symbol of power. Tzipora was her name, and her soiled plumage was entirely pink; it reminded Rosaline of the funny birds she once saw during her travels in the gnome lands. In any case, she found aviantese names difficult to pronounce, so gave her the nickname Beakaboo. "I have food for you, my lady," the aviansie chirped and laid down a dish of fresh fruit, vegetables, and an assortment of mystery meat that Rosaline avoided like the plague. By now both of them had grown accustomed to this routine: Beakaboo entered, spoke those same seven words, and left without so much as a hint of pity or sympathy, the leftovers of her previous delivery going with her. Rosaline figured the bird had enough problems of her own to deal with, and kept the snide comments to a minimum for her sake. Alone again, Rosaline took her meal and began picking at it. She hadn't much of an appetite since Steven's death, whose dying words and accusations were still fresh on her mind. Struggling to ignore them and the cries coming from the arena, Rosaline chose to focus on studying Yu'biusk's horizon. It was hard to guess the exact time with the thick ash clouds and all but she decided it felt somewhere in the early afternoon. More cheers from the arena shook the tower. She tossed the mystery meat over the balcony's ledge, hoping it would please the bloodythirsty brutes. Yokrad's followers kept cheering for at least another fifteen minutes, their savage howls and raw jubilation mingling with the death throes and dying pleas of unlucky slaves. Eventually though the noise from the arena receded to a restless buzz. The rumbling, however, only grew. Rosaline would have been more concerned had she not known what it meant. She turned and found herself face-to-face with the god of war himself: Bandos—or so a person unfamiliar with Yokrad might be led to believe. Despite having never had the unpleasure of meeting Bandos personally, Rosaline knew his visage from her time studying his ruined corpse north of Falador; like Guthix and V before him, he, too, had a memorial made out of his stony remains. But this "Bandos" was dark of countenance, his flesh and armor entirely gray like stone, and had four brown eyes unlike the original's green three. In this sense, Yokrad epitomized how his god might have appeared to his worshipers—so Rosaline figured anyway—whether out of respect, fear, or a twisted sense of humor she didn't know. "Rosaline." Yokrad's voice was like the rumbling that heralded his appearance. It vaguely reminded her of Ptolemos' own booming voice, but somehow...more? It only served to make her more sullen. "Piss off and petrify, Yokrad," she suggested, her tone hard and unapologetic. Suddenly it hit Rosaline—literally. Something heavy cracked her over the head. She dropped unceremoniously, her vision interrupted by a burst of white stars. By the time she came to the air around her was still thick with magic and ozone. She could feel Yokrad's gaze over her; the god was watching her carefully. Perhaps he thought she was dead. If the headache was any indication... "You are free to walk the city," Yokrad spoke, his voice reverberating through her head like thunderclaps. "Stray outside its boundaries and die." And then he was gone. Rosaline groaned, her forehead pressed against the cool stone floor. Maybe insulting a god wasn't her brightest idea, but at least she now had an excuse not to go outside. That was some small relief, in this city without mercy. Outside the people of New Yok welcomed their god with thunderous applause. Category:Blog posts